


Memories

by Rhianne



Category: The Sentinel
Genre: Angst, Gen, Gen Fic, Minor Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-04
Updated: 2012-06-04
Packaged: 2017-11-06 20:09:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,798
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/422725
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rhianne/pseuds/Rhianne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Some tragic news puts Jim into a melancholy, thoughtful mood.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Memories

It was cold, the sharp wind cutting through his thin cotton shirt, piercing his skin like a thousand tiny knives.

Rain was coming. He could smell it in the air -- a thickness settling around him as clouds began to gather. Above him the skies were blue and bright, but he was standing on the brow of a hill and all he had to do was extend his eyesight down over the valley below to see the dark clouds swirling over the town, pushed in by the sea-breeze coming off the bay.

Jim wasn’t interested in the view. Instead, his gaze was fixed firmly on the ground just four feet in front of him. The overturned earth was glistening with mid-morning dew that clung stubbornly to the few blades of grass that had survived the digging.

The tombstone would be added later, once the earth had been given time to settle. He knew that, but somehow, staring down at an unmarked grave seemed particularly appropriate -- the person beneath the ground as unknown to him in death as she was in life.

He supposed he should feel upset at the loss, knowing that grief was a natural reaction to the death of a family member. Sandburg would have said that he needed to grieve before he could begin to move on, but Jim didn’t feel like he was in mourning. Instead, the only thing he felt was anger -- a cold, slow-burning fury at the woman who had stepped back into his life after so many years, only to immediately abandon him for a second time.

It had only taken him two hours to get here. Two miserable hours straight up Route 705 to Tacoma, and according to the attorney they’d met on their arrival, Grace Ellison had lived here for twenty-eight years.

Long enough to become Grace Bailey instead of Ellison. Long enough to have three grown-up children with her second husband.

Not long enough to once pick up the phone and call the son she’d left behind. Not once.

Instead, Jim had spent his entire adult life not knowing where she was, not even knowing if she was dead or alive. Then came the unexpected phone call from a local Tacoma law firm, regretfully informing him that his mother had died five days before, that he was mentioned in her will and would he mind traveling to Tacoma to see Mr. Lewis?

Crossing his arms in front of him to ward off some of the chill, Jim wondered if his existence had come as a shock to her new family, or if they’d known all along about William Ellison and the two sons that their mother had walked away from long before they were born.

He was alone in the cemetery; it was still very early Friday morning even though he’d been awake for hours. The summer sun wasn’t yet strong enough to counteract the morning chill, and only the small mountain of flowers on top of the overturned earth showed that anyone had been to the grave before him. 

Each bouquet had a card nestled in the flowers, signed by people he didn’t know. He didn’t need to kneel down to read the words, but he did it anyway. Some called her Aunty, some just Grace, but Jim didn’t recognize any of the names, and that tangible reminder of his mother’s new family caused a pang of rejection that made his breath catch in his chest. Tears gathered in his eyes, and as he angrily brushed them away with a swipe of his hand, Jim blamed them on the ice-cold wind.

These people had been her family. The family that she’d preferred, evidently, and as Jim's tears finally began to fall, the scared nine year old boy resurfaced: the one who had woken up one morning to find that his mother had abandoned him, bringing with him all the fears that he'd thought buried along with the memories.

Why had she left in the first place? Why hadn’t she taken him or Stephen with her? Why had she never tried to contact any of them again?

It was obvious that she’d known where he was even if her family hadn’t -- the will had listed him as ‘James Ellison, a police officer in Cascade, Washington’s Major Crimes Unit’. It seemed that Grace Bailey had been keeping watch on him over the years. Even if she hadn’t been, the media had made such a fuss of him after his return from Peru that Jim refused to believe that she wouldn’t have seen his face staring out at her from the newspapers, and yet he’d never received so much as a single letter from her: not even to simply say that she was glad he wasn’t dead. 

She might have been watching him, but still nothing changed the fact that she’d never cared enough to pick up the phone.

In that moment, Jim would have gladly given everything he had for just one more moment with his mother, so that he could ask her a single question.

Why?

The nine year old child that he had been was convinced that he already knew why Grace Ellison had walked out -- because of him. Stephen hadn’t been old enough to understand, but even then little Jimmy Ellison’s senses had been a problem. Skin rashes that no-one could explain, doctors who told his parents he was making up the blackouts -- the zones -- that he’d suffered from even then, not to mention the usual stresses of bringing up a young family. Sentinel hearing had forced him to overhear more than one private conversation between his parents, and disagreeing on how Jimmy’s odd behavior should be handled had featured heavily in the worst of their arguments.

As an adult he knew that he shouldn’t blame himself -- his parents had made their own choices, and deep down he knew that there had been more wrong with the Ellison marriage than differing parenting techniques -- but the things you’d come to believe as a child were hard to ignore.

Blair had reminded him of that late one night, just a few days after he’d run into Stephen again at the race track.

“Jim, you were just a kid,” he’d said. “You weren’t to blame for the break up of your parents’ marriage. They broke up because they stopped loving each other, because they couldn’t live together. Your mom didn’t leave because you didn’t get good enough grades in high school, she didn’t leave because of your senses. There was nothing you could have done to keep them together. This wasn’t your fault.”

And Jim understood that, he really did, but sometimes -- in the middle of the night when his fears were hard to ignore -- he still wondered if perhaps he’d been the straw that broke the camel’s back; that one thing that had finally tipped his mother over the edge. If he’d just tried harder, been a better son, then maybe things would have been different.

Now, he’d never know the truth.

Footsteps crunching across the brittle grass attracted his attention, and he ran a hand across his eyes once more before pulling himself wearily to his feet.

He didn’t bother to look up, his senses already telling him that it was Blair approaching.

Sandburg had been in the loft when the phone call had come, and had climbed into the truck without question, simply taking it for granted that Jim would want his friend to come with him on the difficult journey. At first Jim had been grateful but wary, needing quiet to try and make some sense of the shocking, unwelcome news of his estranged mother’s death. A quiet that he didn’t usually get with Sandburg in the truck, talking nineteen to the dozen about anything and everything that crossed his mind. Their conversations were eclectic and stimulating, and usually Jim thrived on them, but not today. He hadn’t wanted to make the trip alone, though, and had appreciated the support implicit in the wordless gesture. 

To his surprise, Sandburg had been almost silent as they drove, responding to Jim’s questions and making the odd comment here and there, but largely leaving Jim to his thoughts, letting Jim choose the level of conversation between them. Then he’d waited outside the attorney’s while Jim had met with Mr. Lewis, and on their arrival at the cemetery had suddenly felt the need to take a walk to stretch his legs after the long journey. Again Jim had been grateful for the space, smiling at his friend before taking a deep breath and beginning the search for his mother’s grave. 

The footsteps stilled as Sandburg came to a stop next to him, resting a hand on the small of Jim’s back but saying nothing.

They stood side by side for a time, Blair looking out at the view of the bay while Jim gathered his thoughts. Her death made it all seem so final -- somehow it had always been in the back of his mind that one day they’d have the chance to clear the air. Knowing it could never happen now fuelled a deep sadness inside him that warred with the age-old anger.

Whatever happened, she’d still been his mother, and walking out on William Ellison shouldn’t have prevented her from having contact with her sons, even back then. Of course, he’d never tried to find her either, and it would have been easy enough with his contacts at the PD to simply run a background search.

He would never know for certain why his mother had left, and perhaps a part of him didn’t really want to know. Why else would he have held back from tracking her down? Unfortunately, that was one thing Jim did know the answer to -- fear of another rejection had kept him away, in case she really had walked out on all of them, and not just her husband.

At least, if he didn’t know for sure, he could continue to fool himself that circumstance, and perhaps her own fear of being rejected by the children she’d left behind, had been all that kept them apart. 

Taking one final look at the grave, Jim turned to face his partner with a watery smile, and Blair dropped his hand down to his side.

“You hungry?” Jim asked.

Blair considered that for a second. “I could eat,” he said finally, and together they began the long walk across the grass, back down to the truck. 

They walked in silence, Blair staying close enough to Jim that their shoulders brushed together as they moved. Jim brought his own hand up to rest on Blair’s back, guiding him gently through the mass of graves and flowers, and never once looked back to the brow of the hill.


End file.
